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What's a Satellite / Satellite Selfie

Episode #126 / Length: 29 minutes

"What's a Satellite?" - An Earth-orbiting "telecom" communications satellite breaks down, and satellite TV service in Boxwood Terrace stops working. Three people can't watch their favorite shows and consequently get very upset. Jet decides to fly up to space and see what the problem is with the satellite, and hilarity ensues. Curriculum: A satellite is an artificial object that has been intentionally placed into orbit. Satellites are used for a large number of purposes. Communications satellites receive signals from Earth and bounce them back to other locations, for everything from GPS to cell phone service to TV shows. Satellites are usually semi-independent computer-controlled systems. "Satellite Selfie" - The kids learn that they can use links to different websites to see a satellite view of their house. Mindy notices that Jet's house is not in the image. That's because these images are from sometime over the past 2 years, and not live images from space. With Dr. Rafferty's help, the kids identify the next time a satellite will pass over their neighborhood, and try to gather for a "space selfie" next to Jet's house. Curriculum: Satellites are objects that humans have placed into orbit around the Earth. Many have cameras in them. Some of these satellite cameras look "up" at the outer areas of space, and some look "down" at the Earth - they can even see our houses and cars!